Killer Love - Ella Goode Page 0,15
they know what a fact is? If these two were in my class, I’d have failed them.”
Bill is a retired science teacher. That’s where he met Linda, the school receptionist. When he tells the story of how they fell in love, it always starts with Linda dropping a stapler on his foot. Linda says she threw it at him for being a jerk. We all know whose version is accurate.
“Who’d you cut up today?”
“The Benson boy.”
“That’s some sad news. I had his cousin in my biology class. He was dumber than the notebooks he never wrote in.”
“Did he drop your class to graduate?”
“I passed him because no matter how many times he sat in my class, he wasn’t ever going to get it.”
Hearing that Bill bent the rules and passed kids who shouldn’t have been passed surprises me. Bill reads me accurately. He mutes the television and leans over the arm of his chair. “I know you’re a by the book kind of guy, Lucas, and I like that about you. I didn’t think there would be anyone good enough for Angel.”
“I’m not,” I inform him.
“‘Course you’re not. No one is but you’re good enough. You’re steady and trustworthy and you probably would’ve made the Benson boy sit in your class a hundred times if that’s what it took for him to get his grade up, but not everything’s black and white. The Benson kid had two younger siblings and a deadbeat father. He needed to be out of school and making money. Things like Mendel and his peas and his model theories in genetics isn’t going to help him put food on the table. He works out at the washing machine plant welding tubs and making fifty grand a year. Passing him out of biology wasn’t for me; it was for him. Sometimes you do things that aren’t quite right because it helps someone else out. You know what I mean.”
I stare at my father-in-law for a long, silent moment before nodding. “I know what you mean. Some things aren’t always black and white.”
Bill doesn’t know about my nocturnal activities, nor that Chad Dering is bothering his daughter, so it’s unlikely that this speech was meant to give a blessing on my plans for Chad, but it comes off that way because Bill is absolutely correct. Sometimes you do things that aren’t quite right because it helps someone out. I vowed on our wedding day to love, honor and protect her, which means tonight is Chad’s very last one.
Chapter Twelve
Angel
We kiss my parents goodbye before Lucas guides me toward the car on the side of the house. I peek over at my husband. Tonight was like any other night that we spent at my parents’ house. They’ve loved Lucas from the moment I brought him home to meet them. I lean into him as we round the back of the car. He opens the door for me. He’s always the gentleman. Making sure that I want for nothing.
“You okay, darling?” he asks when I don’t step into the car right away. I drop my head back to look up at him. He looks as handsome as ever.
“You have fun with my dad tonight?” I lick my bottom lip, still tasting the wine I’d finished before we left.
“I always enjoy your dad’s company.” He does. Lucas really is the perfect husband. Sometimes I feel terrible because I keep waiting for him to have some sort of flaw but he never does. Can someone really be this perfect? Even the things that he thinks are flaws I don’t agree with. They make him who he is, my Lucas, and more charming, if you ask me.
“What if my dad had told you no when you asked to marry me?” The smile he has falters for a second. My breath hitches when I swear for a brief moment something dark flashes in his eyes. My nipples harden.
“Then I’d have worked harder at winning him over.”
I purse my lips, thinking over his answer. He leans down, kissing my warm cheeks which are flushed from a mix of the wine and my arousal.
“You going to get in the car so I can take my tipsy wife home and take advantage of her?”
“You would never.” I sigh.
“No,” he agrees.
“You can’t take advantage of the willing.” I go to get into the car but he stops me.
“Angel.”
I look back up at him. His face is serious. Did I say something wrong? He was right. I am a